“I thought you were a socialist.”
“Just like you’re always going on about, isn’t it?”
“…………”
Merka stood at the bow of the little boat and slowly shook his head.
With the moonlight reflected on the river, Merka’s face looked rosy and beautiful as a lotus.
He furrowed his brow slightly and opened his mouth, then closed it again.
The lonely river pool shimmered with a faint glow.
Merka gently scooped up a handful of river water.
The water shimmered like a jewel in Merka’s hand. It quietly slipped through his fingers, like woven silver flowing from a fairy’s hand.
“No, darling.”
“I’m not an -ist of any kind.”
“You know, what I want isn’t really all that complicated…”
“I just hope everyone can live happily, with dignity.”
“…………Is that so hard?”
“Why can’t we make that vision a reality, no matter how far technology advances production?”
Turing leaned against the opposite side of the bow and gave a slight nod.
Her hazy eyes opened a little, and she fixed Merka with a gaze like Wangshu’s, like a sigh.
Turing wasn’t thinking about anything at all.
Or maybe she’d thought about everything already, only to realize it was no use.
She squeezed into the little space at the bow, curled up like a baby in its swaddling.
She slipped into the bunk built into the boat, tugged the blanket around herself, and gazed tenderly at Merka as he rowed.
Her lover from a dream rolled up his sleeves, braced his veined arms, and pushed the oar toward the riverbed in slow, unhurried strokes.
His eyes seemed to have no color, and yet to hold every color in the world.
Turing couldn’t imagine anything more beautiful in the world.
Turing didn’t answer Merka.
She knew Merka carried a lot on his shoulders.
But she believed in him, too. He was strong enough to carry that burden forever and keep moving forward.
He was a saint born from the mire.
【Merka.】
【Merka, Merka.】
Turing silently murmured Merka’s name in her heart.
Her mood turned sweet with astonishing speed.
The riverbanks of Venice were like a star-filled sky embracing everything, quietly telling of a loneliness no one cared to notice.
The quiet, trickling current parted around the boat’s keel and followed behind it like little boneless fish.
Merka took off his cumbersome coat and tied it around his waist, leaving only a thin shirt on.
He lowered his gaze to the riverbed and softly sang a hymn from Acadian religion about the Son’s homecoming.
He slowly planted the spoon-shaped oar into the riverbed, as clear and rich as bean soup.
The veins on the back of Merka’s hand rose slightly. His fine skin stretched over collarbones like glass, and tiny beads of sweat trickled down the side of his face. He looked like a lotus rising from the water.
Rising from the mud, yet unstained; washed by clear water, yet not coquettish.
Though Merka had the soul of a saint, everyone knew that soul was lodged in the impure body of a Curseborn.
Did that prove that only suffering could nourish the soil from which saints grew?
Turing was the exact opposite. She had a violent, unrestrained heart, but it was lodged in a flawless body.
This has been said many times, but it’s true—
Though the two were complete opposites, like yin and yang, they were a match made in heaven.
“Turing, are we there yet?”
Merka gently rested the oar against the bow, then slowly sat down along the side of the boat.
The calm current began to pick up speed.
From here on, the boat could travel easily even without the oar.
“The moon wanes, the tide rises, the dust settles…”
“I kiss you softly.”
“I softly kiss my whole world… Ahem.”
“We’re here, we’re here.”
“We’re almost there～～”
Turing softly joined in, imitating Merka’s singing.
Her voice was as clear and sweet as water dripping through a mountain stream. Even without carefully shaping its rises and falls, it sounded as lovely as a song.
“Look ahead.”
A church, neither large nor small, appeared beside the creek.
It stood quietly beneath the faint, warm light, as if silently keeping watch at the edge of the world.
